Esteemed horror movie writer, Oliver Parks, adds to his long list of horror titles with The Offering. When an ancient demon is unleashed in a Jewish morgue, the life of an unborn child comes under threat from the sinister force.
The Offering – What it’s all About
Secretly struggling with his finances, Art (played by Nick Blood) visits his father’s home in a final bid to save his own property from repossession.
Threatened with eviction, Art seeks to have his father sign over his own house to the bank as collateral, he just needs the right time to ask. All the while, his fiance, Claire (Emm Wiseman), is blissfully unaware of her partner’s shortfallings in his work as a real estate agent.
While helping his father out in his in-house morgue, Art works on the body of a Jewish man with a knife protruding from his chest and an amulet worn around his neck. Obviously having never seen a horror movie in his life, our hapless hero pulls the Hebrew-inscripted blade from the creepy dead dude and inadvertently releases an ‘Abyzou’, or ‘Taker of Children’ to it’s friends.
The Offering Brings an Interesting Insight into Jewish Heritage
Focusing around Jewish folklore, The Offering gives the viewer an interesting insight into the culture surrounding Judaism and the ways of the Jewish people.
We’re invited to learn of new existential views and of religion, age-old traditions and of deep-seated superstitions. Not something you would expect from a horror movie, but more than welcome.
The Offering – An Atmospheric Journey
The world of The Offering takes us back to the days of yore, before any of us walked this earth. The Victorian-esque decor and furnishings of the house-cum-morgue, set the perfect scene for a horror movie.
Furthermore, this atmospheric quality is coupled with some fine acting. Most notably, Allen Corduner (Mosquito) as Saul, Art’s long-suffering father and, of course, the great Paul Kaye (Lilleyhammer and Game of Thrones). Playing the part of Haemish, Kaye perfectly portrays Saul’s personal assistant, who is immediately hostile to Art and suspicious of his intentions.
A Crying Shame
While The Offering is seeping with promise, it was ultimately let down by the ‘creature’ part of this creature-feature. The movie was doing so well with early scenes of a ghostly apparition that had taken to the form of a child. We were looking forward to seeing this entity a little more as said scenes were both unsettling and midly creepy. However, the story fast took a different track and went down the tired, old, rackety rails of a monster movie.
This wouldn’t have been all that bad, if only the monster in question wasn’t straight out of a 1980’s B-movie.
The Abyzou depicted in The Offering is a great example of why sometimes, less is, in fact, more. With it’s horned goats head and strange hairy body, the monster always appears fleetingly and, somehow, far less realistically each time. It’s almost like they have dusted off a long-forgotton prop and just wheeled it onto set for a few (thankfully) scenes.
The Offering – Summary
Overall, The Offering is definitely worth a watch. The cultural references are interesting and the movie is well sewn together. Despite the aforementioned monster, there are some genuinely shining moments that prove to be the saving grace of this otherwise average title.
The atmospheric surroundings do well to pull the viewer in, while the story is simple, straight to the point and typical of Parks’ talent.
With its relatively short runtime of 94-minutes, the movie packs a decent pace and holds viewer interest until the final credits roll.
